University of Tartu and Huawei signed a memorandum of understanding

On Thursday, 21 November, Vice Rector for Development of the University of Tartu Erik Puura and Country Manager of Huawei Technologies Bin Chang signed a memorandum with which Huawei wants to cooperate more actively with the University of Tartu.

“Huawei has cooperation agreements with many universities in Europe and the rest of the world, and we’re happy to see that similar opportunities also open to Estonian universities,” said Erik Puura. “We hope that the establishment of the Delta Centre will increase the interest of large international corporations in cooperating with is even more.”

The memorandum lists three important areas of cooperation – supporting studies, joint research and development of infrastructure.

Cooperation in the field of education means offering grants and traineeship opportunities to the students of UT. Huawei also wants to contribute to the Industrial Master’s and Doctoral Programmes.

The cooperation of the UT and Huawei in research and development has already started and they are studying the area of fibre-optic communication together. New joint projects will be sought and development in this area on the basis of the memorandum.

Huawei also wants to support the development of the infrastructure of the Institute of Computer Science of the UT. The focus is on the testing equipment required for the development and research of the Internet of things, artificial intelligence and cloud technology.

Head of the UT Institute of Computer Science Jaak Vilo emphasised that the activities that allow students to test themselves in complicated situations are important to students and scientists.

“We find it important that the university has access to new technology, the solutions created by scientists get to companies and applications, and new traineeship and career opportunities emerge for students,” added Vilo.

“We’re creating an open platform for cooperation with companies and include students and scientists in our activities,” said Vilo about the plans of the Institute of Computer Science. “Mainly the ones that value the university’s competence and contribute to the development of education, research and innovation capability in the society.”

Country Manager of Huawei Bin Chang said that the advantages of the University of Tartu are its high level of research and globally strong reputation. According to Chang, the objective of such cooperation projects is to contribute to technology, research and development equally in all countries and regions.

For further information please contact: Erik Puura, UT Vice-Rector for Development, +372 50 69 882, erik.puura@ut.ee